ELAINE MERK
(19 December 1930 – 21 September 2025)
Photo by Chris Warren, Courtesy of AMS Pictures
One of the last surviving Munchkins from the 1939 classic The Wizard of Oz, former child actor Elaine Merk Binder, has passed away at the age of 94. She was cast in 1938 as one of just a dozen or so children chosen to sing and dance alongside the ensemble of 124 little people portraying Munchkins. She appears in the ‘Come Out, Come Out, Wherever You Are’ sequence up the steps in the second little house and can be spotted as one of eight dancers in a pavilion at the rear in a dark green dress and hat just before ‘Off to See the Wizard’ begins. She was just eight years old when she made the classic film and even celebrated her birthday on the MGM set. Looking back on the experience decades later, she admitted how intimidating the audition process was; “For me it was scary. It was my first big call for girls from a major studio.”
Beyond Oz, Binder performed in Our Gang and Little Rascals shorts and appeared in films such as Nothing Sacred opposite Carole Lombard and Frederic March, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, and The Star Maker with Bing Crosby. Though Paramount offered her a contract as a teenager, Binder chose instead to pursue education, earning a degree from Occidental College in 1951 and a master’s from Cal State Los Angeles in 1953. Binder studied computer science and theology, ultimately working as a consultant for USC and First Interstate Bank. In recent years, she reflected on her time in The Wizard of Oz for writer/producer Randy Schmidt’s excellent 2024 documentary Mysteries of Oz, offering a rare first-hand glimpse into the making of one of cinema’s greatest treasures. She is survived by just two other ‘Munchkins’, former child stars Priscilla Montgomery and Valerie Lee.
CHAD KENNERK
